Monday, December 6, 2010

I Still Write Crap, And I'm Okay With It

I finished a rough draft in November, the first I've finished in a really long time, actually. As I was writing it, I noticed something:

I still write like crap. This is like the 12th or 13th rough draft I've written, and yes, I still write like crap.

No, don't go leaving comments about how I am being too hard on myself and whatnot. I'm not fishing for compliments here. I'm being honest. All the time I typed up this book, I was like, "Oh gosh, that's a cliché, but I need to get this scene out so it'll just have to wait. Noooo, an adverb! Crap, I just typed 'suddenly' for the third time this page...I'm pretty sure my MC sighs more than humanly possible..." And so on and so forth.

I know I am writing crap sometimes. I know I'll have to go back and edit my prose into the ground. But you know what? I'm cool with that. For me, the rough draft isn't the place for getting super picky with words. I can only focus on one thing at a time, and in the rough draft it's mostly the plot that I'm concerned with. I have to string together a series of events that leads to an awesome climax, and that's kind of hard! I can barely do that AND develop 3D characters at the same time. Why should I expect myself to get every sentence right on top of that?

Well, I don't expect it. I write crap, knowing it'll get fixed later when I have the story and characters right.

Not that I go out of my way to write horribly, I just don't obsess over a bad phrase or cruddy description. I do reread my chapters, fix typos and other things that bug me. But I don't heavily edit until later drafts, not until I'm confident the story is in fairly good shape.

I know other writers work differently, but I'm finally getting to a place where I'm okay with this part of my process. I can own the fact that I write crap sometimes...or often. It's a good thing I'm a pretty decent reviser.

I call it spewing personally, but we are definitely on the same page as far as the crap goes.The important thing to me in the first draft is to get the gist of the story down. I really enjoy revising so my method is get it out no matter what and then take my time when I go back through.

Thanks for your honesty! I had to laugh when you said your MC sighs more than humanly possible. Our MCs must be related because mine does the same thing (and I'm not on a first draft!). The first draft is actually the easy part for me- just sitting down and writing what comes to mind. I have a hard time with the revision process. I just don't "see" all my adverbs, suddenlys and sighs. Hopefully this round of edits (my last actually) will get rid of all or most of them!

Writing first draft crap is my specialty... if I didn't allow myself to just spew it out onto the page, I'd never get anything done! Here's to crap, since it will eventually -- with a lot of hard work -- get spun into gold :)

I don't know anyone who doesn't write crap. I know a lot of people who won't admit to it (so I applaud you!) but I don't think anyone can write a perfect sentence on the first try. Hell, I can't even spell sentence! (I love spellcheck)

I hear ya! And I'm right there with you, lol! My first drafts are often crap - but, I've recently begun to accept that and try to get myself through it without to much fix-as-you-write editing. I'm getting better... :)

"I know other writers work differently, but I'm finally getting to a place where I'm okay with this part of my process."

Yep. That's what 2010 was for me. Learning what kind of writer I was, and then accepting in. Took the entire year, lol, and I'll probably always need some refreshers/reminders, but it feels good, to be at peace with one's self.

Good to know I'm not alone. I still consider myself a "beginner", but I know my first drafts will always be crap. I tend to ask a lot of questions through my main character. Now i have to go back and answer them!

My sister writes that way, too. I do to a lesser extent (try to get it to capture the essence of what I'm trying to write, polish later).

I often go back, though, and despite my discovery that I put a "d" on the end of "an" far too often and frequently leave out whole words in my haste, it's really not crap and reads much better than I expected.

I think, sometimes, flying through can let it come out more purely than when you're struggling to get out every line.

But then, that could just be me. I think there are so many different ways of writing that no one method works for everyone.

Sighs, laughs, blinks... my characters do all of those in inordinate amounts. I find the only time I don't write crap in any given writing session is if I have a scene so perfectly entrenched in my mind that I can just set my fingers on the keyboard and the words flow out beautifully... but that's only happened once or twice in, oh, twelve years of writing? The rest of what I write most definitely has to be edited. And edited again. And again. And maybe a hundred more times...

I've read a lot of good things about how we need to give ourselves permission to write crap, but they're usually aimed at beginning writers, like you write crap once and then figure it out and never do it again.

Yeah. Just because I know I overuse the word "just" doesn't mean I can actually catch myself doing it the first time around. Similarly, I know I should just (!) eat right and exercise every day, but that isn't as easy as it sounds, either, thankyouverymuch.

Here's what I think. Writing crap isn't just for beginners. It isn't practice, it's PROCESS. That's why EVERY novel has a first draft. EVERY published book has an editor. Writing is rewriting. And that "crap"? It's the scaffold we need to build the building. It looks bad, and gets torn down eventually, but it's NECESSARY. It keeps the best parts of our work in place until they're ready to stand on their own.

I LOVE my first drafts - it is the revisions that are torture for me. NOT doing them - I love that too - it is the getting motivated to actually sit down and do them. I would rather write tons and tons of first drafts. LOL

I'm scared of editing hardcore like that. What if it's SO BAD that I can't even fix it? So I've been trying to make everything I write good enough and wow... really has slowed me down. Someday I'll let go of my perfectionism... SOMEDAY.

I just wrote a blog post about how I'm embracing the "$hi*ty first draft," a term Anne Lamott talks about in her book, Bird by Bird. I'd been struggling to get through my first draft because I'm constantly self-editing but I'm not doing it anymore! I need to let go and just write, knowing it may suck but I can always go back and fix everything later.

I just recently found your blog and I'm super impressed by your decication to writing and how quickly you get through your drafts! :)

I used to adamantly refuse to believe that a first draft should be anything less than your best... and I wrote like a slug. Then I did NaNoWriMo, and it was the best thing that ever happened to me! To be honest, it wasn't that much worse than my slow rought drafts. It's just like you said: there's something very valuable about just getting it down and focusing on one thing at a time.

I think I need to accept that it's ok to write like crap. Since I'm doing a rewrite of a novel, I keep feeling like this rewrite needs to be perfect. But, in essence it's just a rough draft of THIS version of my novel. It's got the same characters but the story is different. I need to chillax. And like you said let the story come out first, then go back and fix it. I get all writer blocked sometimes because I'm trying to make everything perfect. Thanks for this post.

I work the exact same way. My first drafts are always awful, but I accept it quite cheerfully because I actually love rewriting. I love taking the crappy words and even the crappy plot and characters and turning them into something better!

Love this -- I'm right there with you. My characters sigh too much. And play with their hair too much. And sometimes they talk too much . . . yeah, you see where I'm going. My writing process varies. Sometimes I just need to write the scene, crap included. Other times, I need to go back and work on revisions before I can move forward. And I've definitely had the experience of working a scene over and over for months . . . and then cutting it in the end. For me, it's just all part of the process. And the fun.

Yes how do you write? That has concept has always facinated me were does the story come from? Is it more important to get the story down or polish the prose? For me I find that the prose is the last aspect the most important function of writing is to commite the elusive story to visible words before it escapes. In fact I never look at what I've typed for minutes just letting the story come out.Of course after that the editing is always amusing!

My characters do a whole lot of nodding, along with their sighing. I also begin an AWFUL lot of sentences with "I" and "My." ;) But, like you, I figure there's time to fix it later, and I try not to worry about it too much in the first draft.

I can write long passages that end up being transcribed more or less verbatim (barring plot tweaks), but the moment I get more ideas than I can write down, notes give way to sentences containing 'blah's and I end up with sections tthat can take an age to pick through.

I agree with you and everyone else here. Have you read 'Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within' by Natalie Goldberg.

She gives us permission to write crap. In fact we can't write well if we don't write crap in between. As long as we keep going!

I often start writing my blog posts and then delete them because I feel like I'm writing a load of drivel. Then I don't post for months. So I'm glad I've read your post and the others responses. We're obviously not alone.

I'm so glad to know I'm not the only one who writes crappy first drafts! I have to get the words down in order to fix them. And then the plot. And then characters. And then everything else. I can't worry about adverbs or characterization or even punctuation or I'll never get it finished :)

My crit partner is completely the opposite - makes for some interesting discussions.

Ugh, I need to be okay with writing crap. That's my problem- I labor over a scene, or a word, or the fact that I used "suddenly" three times and it take me forever to finish my first draft. So I really need to embrace my crap so I can just get it done, and worry about it being perfect after.

Natalie Whipple

I am an author and card-carrying nerd. My favorite areas of the nerd realm include anime, Korean dramas, good cheese, and playing mmorpgs with my family. I take pride in writing the weirdest books I can think of, and my novels TRANSPARENT and BLINDSIDED, HOUSE OF IVY & SORROW, and RELAX, I'M A NINJA are just some of my wacky ideas.